


Burning

by littlered



Category: Castlevania, Castlevania (Cartoon)
Genre: F/M, Hurt/Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-04
Updated: 2020-05-04
Packaged: 2021-03-03 03:27:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,270
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24008095
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/littlered/pseuds/littlered
Summary: Trevor and Sypha discover that Alucard has changed in the time they've been gone.
Relationships: Alucard | Adrian Tepes | Arikado Genya/Trevor Belmont, Trevor Belmont/Sypha Belnades, pre-ot3 if you squint - Relationship
Comments: 2
Kudos: 68





	Burning

**Author's Note:**

> Title from the song by Maggie Rogers, which is pretty relevant to this fic.

The air feels different when they pull up to Alucard’s castle. No longer crisp and fresh, the first days of spring still hanging in the air, but damp and almost acrid. As they walk up the drive, Trevor sees why. Bodies, two, stuck on poles at the entrance. They have clearly been there for some time; the circling ravens have left barely any tissue on the bone. Trevor and Sypha share a look, her eyes are wide and worried as she jumps down from the wagon and strides to the door. Trevor is close behind, unsure of who or what lies beyond the door to the castle. He expects to find it in terrible disarray, potentially with more bodies strewn about, but when the door swings open it just seems empty.

“Alucard?” Sypha calls into the darkness. “It’s us. Sypha and Trevor. Are you here?” As if he couldn’t recognize her by the accent alone. A silence follows.

“Looks like we’ll have to do a bit of adventuring.” Trevor is not at all enthusiastic about walking through the massive castle with all of its dark corners and secret passageways. But, he supposes, it’s better than standing in the doorway until Alucard appears. He and Sypha walk further into the entryway and he tries to recall the layout of the building. “Maybe we should split up, look for him separately.”

Sypha rolls her eyes. “When has that ever been a good idea? We will stick together.” Trevor shrugs his deference, raising an arm as if to say you first. “Let’s try the main hall and the kitchens first.”

The pair quietly traipses through the first floor, Sypha lighting the torches along the wall as they go. Even though it is barely evening, the castle is oddly dim and shadowy. After a thorough search of all the rooms on the floor, Trevor decides that Alucard must be elsewhere in the castle.

“We should do this strategically. There have to be a thousand rooms in this castle, and I’m not searching every one of them.”

“I agree, we do not want to waste time. Something feels… off. Let’s try his bedroom, and his father’s office.” Sypha navigates the corridors well, quickly finding the main staircase and locating the right floor. There is, somewhat ominously, one light flickering at the end of the hallway. They walk towards it, their hands nearly touching as they unconsciously seek each other out.

“Alucard?” Sypha tries again when they reach a slightly ajar door at the end of the hallway, leading to a room emitting more candlelight. It looks like a spare room, sparsely decorated but for a table and chairs against one wall, and a large armchair by the fireplace. Trevor pushes the door open further and sees Alucard sitting with his back to them in the armchair. He does not start at Sypha’s voice, leading Trevor to believe he could hear them since they pulled up at the property. They step closer to him, falling a few feet short of where he sits.

“Nice of you to visit.” Alucard does not turn or rise from his chair.

“I – we were always going to come back. We would not just leave you here…” Sypha stutters, surprised at his cold tone.

“There is no need. I can handle being on my own.” Alucard finally stands, turning to face the pair. Trevor catalogues his face, noting all the changes from the few months they’ve been apart. Alucard seems somehow more pale and gaunt than when they left, his golden eyes barely sparkling in the last light of the day. He is still Alucard though, all sharp lines and pale, almost glowing skin.

“I see you have some new decorations out front.” Trevor tries for lighthearted. Sypha elbows him in the ribs, but Alucard does not respond, staring him down instead. “When did that happen?”

“A month after your departure. It matters not. As I said, I handled it.” Alucard, who had been rather emotive in the past (if mostly in annoyance when it came to Trevor) is now unmoving as stone. The situation is clearly worse than Trevor thought. Alucard seems to shake himself out of his thoughts, looking between Trevor and Sypha. “But I’m being a bad host. Have you eaten?”

Sypha agrees to dinner and follows Alucard into the hallway, Trevor close behind. Most of the doors in the hallway are open, as if Alucard has spent his days aimlessly walking in and out of rooms. But one door in the middle of the hallway, which Trevor recalls as the dhampir’s bed chamber, is tightly shut. He makes a mental note to peek inside the next time Alucard is out gathering food. If he’s not going to tell them the truth, Trevor will have to find it for himself.

Dinner is a quiet affair, awkward and stiff. Afterwards, Alucard points them towards a room they can sleep in, not bothering to ask if they want to share. He sulks off into the shadows after bidding them goodnight.

In bed, Sypha turns to Trevor. “What do we do?”

“Hey, visiting was your idea, I think you should figure it out.”

“Trevor.”

“Fine. We can try talking to him tomorrow. He has to give in eventually, right?”

As it turns out, Alucard does not see it that way and avoids the conversation entirely, either by repeating that it doesn’t matter or simply by leaving the room. After a couple of days, it’s wearing Sypha down.

“I don’t understand. Why won’t he just tell us? We are his friends. We helped him kill Dracula.”

“I don’t know, Sypha. Maybe we just need to wait.”

But Sypha always needs to move. Trevor knows this, had counted on the visit at the castle being a short one. They had hoped to convince Alucard to come travel with them for a time, escape his childhood home and his father’s grave. But days in it is clear that Alucard needs someone to stay. Trevor knows it will have to be him. Though Sypha is always compelled to move, she is also always innately conscious of his feelings. He does not need to ask permission or have a conversation with her, she understands. Maybe better than Trevor does himself.

One night she mentions wanting to check in on one of the towns they had visited weeks ago at dinner, and is gone the next morning after wishing him luck. Trevor misses her the moment the wagon fades from view, but he sighs and turns back towards the cold castle. He finds Alucard in the kitchen cleaning up from breakfast.

“I guess it’s just me and you now.” Trevor says faux-cheerily.

“You could leave, too.” Alucard points out.

“No, I don’t think I could sleep knowing I could be here annoying you instead.” Alucard rolls his eyes and does not respond.

A week and a half into Trevor’s stay, they are running low on fresh fruit and vegetables. Trevor offers to ride to the nearest village and see what he can buy, but Alucard insists on gathering the food himself, alone. Trevor doesn’t argue. They have been stuck in the castle together for some time, tip toeing around each other in an uncomfortable dance. Some alone time could do them both good.

Trevor remains in the kitchen when Alucard heads out, the image of nonchalance with his chair tipped back and a glass in his hand. He waits for a few minutes until he is sure Alucard is out of earshot, then makes his way to the staircase and up to the hallway he and Sypha had found Alucard in upon their return. One door is still closed, and Trevor thinks he even sees dust on the handle. He grabs it, expecting the door to be locked or stuck. Instead it opens easily and Trevor takes a step into the room.

It looks as though someone has attempted to deep clean the room, but gave up part way through. The bed is stripped but blood stains permeate down into the mattress, and a pile of dirty sheets lay in a corner. The acrid smell Trevor recalls from his arrival at the castle lingers in the air, undoubtedly trapped in the room for months. Something definitely happened in this room, likely involving the two out front. But Alucard doesn’t seem the type to brutally murder his lovers, or to even have lovers in the first place. Trevor finds that the room has given him more questions than answers. After some time, he turns away, intending to head back downstairs before Alucard returns.

Only to find him leaning against the wall in the hallway, arms crossed and eyes unreadable.

“Uhhh….” Trevor isn’t quick enough to think of an excuse.

“You know generally when someone offers you their hospitality, you don’t repay them by going through their things.”

“I didn’t realize it was off limits.”

“Didn’t realize or didn’t care?” Alucard spits at Trevor.

“What happened, Alucard?” Trevor’s voice is hard but quiet as he tries to conceal his emotion. This isn’t about him or how he feels about what he just found.

“Fine. Maybe if I tell you, you’ll leave, too.” Trevor doesn’t think this is the time to point out that Sypha left because Alucard wouldn’t let her help him.

Alucard is intense but almost emotionless, like the night he told Trevor and Sypha about what had happened to his mother, and his father’s plans for revenge. He fixes his gaze over Trevor's shoulder and begins to speak.

“They arrived a few weeks after you left.” He does not say their names. “They wanted my help learning how to fight vampires so they could take the knowledge back to their homeland. I taught them what I could, but it wasn’t enough. I thought… I did not know what to think when they came to my room that night. I had never been with anyone like that before.”

Trevor recalls Alucard telling Sypha that he had grown up very fast, and he wonders what other adolescent milestones he had missed out on. Trevor already has so many questions, but he restrains himself. If he interrupts him now, Alucard may never finish telling the story.

“While I was… distracted, they tied me up. They wanted to kill me, said I wasn’t teaching them the truth about what they needed to know. So I had to kill them. And now they serve as a warning for anyone else who tries to trick me.” He is still not looking directly at Trevor, and there is silence for a moment before Trevor reaches out.

“Alucard…”

“I do not need your pity, Belmont. I dealt with it then, and I can deal with anything else that happens.” Trevor drops his hand, stung by the rebuke.

“This isn’t pity. We didn’t come back because we felt bad for you, it was because we missed you. Gods, I can’t believe I’m saying this out loud.” He takes the few steps needed to put him right in front of Alucard, looking him directly in the eyes. “I don’t know why all that happened to you, but I’m glad you made it out. We need you, and I need you, even if you are a vampire.”

“Half.”

“Half.” Trevor agrees. “But I can’t help you if you just sulk around this castle and only talk when we’re arguing.”

“But isn’t that what we’re best at?” Trevor thinks he sees the ghost of a smile on Alucard’s lips.

“I bet we could find some other things that we would be good at.” Trevor waggles his eyebrows facetiously, trying to lighten the mood. Alucard finally huffs a laugh at that, albeit a small one. He closes the door to his room and they walk towards the staircase together.

That night, Trevor thinks about Alucard living in this castle, alone, after all of that. Though Trevor’s first time hadn’t been anything to write home about (if he’d still had a home), it didn’t end with him killing his bed partner, and he hadn’t been tricked into it. He imagines Alucard walking between their staked bodies every time he goes outside. Cannot fathom, even in his own masochistic ways, putting himself through that. Trevor thought he understood guilt and grief before, but now he sees that he understands nothing. As long as he can remember, Trevor has always been a man with a plan, the first to make suggestions in battle and otherwise. It disorients him that he has no idea how to attack this situation with Alucard. He has no strategies to help him.

He contemplates their relationship, trying to figure out how he, emotionally repressed, monster-fighting Trevor Belmont, can help Alucard. It’s true, from the outside their relationship might not look the friendliest, but Trevor figures that has more to do with their individual personalities than any issues they have with each other. Anyone who could laugh amicably after being told to eat shit and die is good in his book.

So it’s not a huge surprise to Trevor when over the next several days, he and Alucard are able to pick up almost where they left off. It seems that just telling someone what happened has lifted a weight from Alucard’s shoulders. Though not as close as Trevor and Sypha, the two men had traveled together for days and nights, had fought together and rebuilt the castle together. And maybe it was good that their relationship was different from his with Sypha. They were two men, who could jest together and tussle without having to pull their punches. And where Sypha would have stepped carefully around Alucard with her niceness, Trevor was ready to ask the hard questions and get everything out in the open.

But Sypha was right when she had said that even standing next to Alucard was lonely, that he felt like the cold spot in a room. There was so much that Trevor did not, could not understand, despite everything he too had been through. The feeling was only amplified after Alucard’s recent ordeal. Sometimes it hurt to sit with him, and more so to look into his eyes and guess his thoughts. Trevor is not sure that Alucard’s grief will ever heal, even in all of the years he has ahead of him.

Trevor knows that he has to try though, and between trying to rile Alucard up with inappropriate jokes and getting the rest of the details about Taka and Sumi (apparently the names belonging to the corpses outside), he thinks it might be working. Most days, Trevor can pull at least a few smiles out of Alucard, and having to feed a human regularly encourages him to eat, allowing his muscles to fill back out, his hair to shine and grow, and his skin to gain some color again. Trevor thinks Sypha will be rather proud of him when she returns.

She may also be surprised though. She has always been the link between the three of them, with Trevor and Alucard on either side of her. Trevor doesn’t know what the dynamic will be like when they’re all back together again. But he knows that, very slowly, Alucard is improving, and they will deal with whatever changes occur if it means he’s healing.

And he does seem to be healing, maybe even on the border of happiness. One night, two weeks after Sypha’s departure, Trevor joins Alucard for dinner. Trevor feels a difference in the atmosphere. There are but a few candles lit in the kitchen, where they take their meals. And there is wine set out, which they have each been trying to avoid for their own reasons. And Alucard is seated at the table, and he is glowing. Trevor doesn’t know if it’s the candlelight, or the amused uptick of Alucard’s mouth, or something else entirely, but suddenly Alucard is looking much more appetizing than the food set across the table. Trevor vaguely wonders if Alucard has secretly been sucking his blood over time and that’s why he feels like his head is entirely full of air.

“Are you alright?” Alucard breaks the silence, still looking slightly amused at Trevor’s confusion. Trevor tries to think of a quick retort but finds himself unable to.

“Yes, fine. Is it a bit dark in here?”

“Perhaps. Why don’t you sit?” So he does. He feels a bit better once he’s firmly in his chair. His chair, because he’s the only person who’s been sitting in it, for every meal for the past few weeks, directly across from Alucard. Trevor knows that things have changed, but he somehow hadn’t realized that things had changed until now. Leave it to him to ignore what is right in front of him.

Dinner is quiet, just the two of them passing comments back and forth about the work they’ve done on the Belmont hold, the changing of the seasons, whatever mindless thoughts pop into their heads. Trevor is trying not to drink his wine too quickly, worried that his head will become even foggier.

“Trevor.” Alucard breaks him out of his thoughts. In half a second he is around the table, standing quite close to Trevor’s chair, looking down on him with an imperceptible expression. Trevor is almost too shocked to register being called by his first name. “You being here… it has been unexpectedly helpful. Perhaps I was lonelier than I thought. Thank you.”

The last words are whispered as he leans closer before gently placing his lips over Trevor’s. For a moment, Trevor is still, somehow surprised despite all the lead up to the moment. But then his brain and the warmth in his stomach kick in and he is wrapping a hand around Alucard’s head, tangling his fingers in the long, blonde hair, and kissing back with everything he has. Maybe in a past life, he would have blamed the response on the length of time since he last laid with Sypha or Alucard’s base attractiveness, but here and now he knows it is much more than either of those things. As his mind catches up, he drops his hands from around Alucard and pushes him back. For a moment, he’s pretty sure Alucard is an angel; flushed lips and face surrounded by a halo of white hair.

“Wait.”

“What?” Alucard is incredulous, sure he had been reading Trevor correctly. Plus, when did Trevor ever say no to sex? Not that Alucard had necessarily thought that far ahead.

“You said ‘thank you’. This isn’t because… I didn’t do this for a reward.” Trevor is a little offended. He doesn’t want Alucard to do anything out of obligation, in part because Alucard should never do that, and in part because he wants Alucard to actually want him.

Alucard huffs out a small laugh. “You are ridiculous, Belmont. If I wanted to thank you, I would give you coin. I thought we had grown closer, that maybe we understood each other. Was I wrong?”

“No.” Trevor is quick to respond. “This is the only time you will ever hear me say this, but you were actually right, for once.” He rises from his chair, pushing himself closer to Alucard. He searches his eyes for a moment before once again kissing him deeply, smothering any chance at a reply.

“Then perhaps we should take this elsewhere.” Alucard flushes slightly as he makes the suggestion.

“Yes, lets.” Trevor grabs his hand and pulls him from the kitchen, dragging him to the nearest bedroom untainted by memories. It’s time they should make some of their own.


End file.
